Long-time judge Jack Halpin retires; says he might do mediation

Retired Shasta County Superior Court Judge Jack Halpin discusses his future plans before a party honoring his many years of work.

Halpin, 86, has been a full-time Shasta County judge since 1994.

Although he's been a retired Shasta County Superior Court judge since 1964, Jack Halpin has been working full time on the bench for nearly 20 years.

But not anymore.

Halpin, 86, was honored Thursday evening by the Shasta-Trinity Bar Association for his many years of judicial work. His last day as a full-time judge was Monday, said Shasta County Superior Court Executive Officer Melissa Fowler-Bradley.

"He's a wonderful man," she said Thursday. "I don't know what we would have done without him over the last decade-and-a-half."

But Halpin, a New Jersey native and Marine Corps veteran, is just not suited for the quiet retirement life.

He's tried it a number of times without success since the 1960s, and he's not sure what his plans are for the future.

"I have been giving it a lot of thought, and I might do mediation," he said Thursday.

But, he said, he does not believe he will return to the bench as a part-time judge.

He has been working as a Shasta County judge through an assignment program administered by the state Administrative Office of the Courts.

Admitted to the state Bar in 1952 after receiving his law degree in 1951 from Stanford Law School, Halpin was appointed by then Gov. Edmund G. Brown — Gov. Jerry Brown's father — as a Shasta County Superior Court judge in 1962.

Halpin retired from the bench only two years later in 1964 when he was appointed deputy director of state finance. He was promoted that same year to chief deputy director of finance but quit to run for the state Senate in 1965, a race he lost to Republican Fred Marler.

Halpin first came to Shasta County in 1953 to work as a private attorney but has worked as a lawyer in New York and Hawaii and has been a full-time Shasta County judge since 1994.

One of the cases he handled as a private attorney was against Southern Pacific Transportation Co., which gained notoriety in 1970 when he obtained a court order against the railroad that put a locomotive out of service until the company paid a judgment to one of Halpin's clients.

A deputy constable slapped the cuffs onto the guardrail of the locomotive, which was pictured in the Record Searchlight, and a $48,000 check was reportedly sent to Halpin later that day.

Fowler-Bradley, who noted Halpin was the primary attorney in condemnation cases when Interstate 5 was being constructed through the north state, said Halpin has been a tireless judge.

"He's had an incredible workload capacity," she said, adding that court staff workers have a hard time keeping up with him. "He's a workhorse."

He was instrumental in helping to settle the well-publicized case against Tenet Healthcare Corp. and Redding Medical Center for hundreds of alleged unnecessary cardiac procedures and surgeries performed at RMC.

"He brought all that litigation to a close," Fowler-Bradley said.

Since 2008, Halpin has been presiding over family law cases, but he's come under fire from some critics who claim he's performed poorly and is too old to be a judge.

Fowler-Bradley, however, said Halpin has an excellent appellate record, and that handling family law cases can be a thankless job without any true winners.

"They are extremely contentious cases," she said, adding that those judges handling family law are often the butt of criticism by those affected by their decisions. "That's just the nature of the beast."

Losing a full-time judge is putting a strain on the local court, Fowler-Bradley said.

Judge Greg Gaul has taken over the busy family law calendar, and his cases will be handled by assigned judges on a rotating basis.

Fowler-Bradley also said Judge Wilson Curle, without making a formal announcement, retired at the end of September.

Fowler-Bradley said that although he continues to work full time on the bench, Curle has not committed himself to sit full time until Gov. Brown appoints a replacement, since no one knows when that appointment might be made.

She said Curle intends to take some time off later this summer, and he is considering more full-time work later this year and next.

According to a fact sheet provided by the state Administrative Office of the Courts, a retired judge sitting on a full-time assignment receives, in addition to his or her retirement pension, about $166,486 annually, which is 92 percent of the salary of an active judge.

California's judges are paid $178,789 a year.

The daily salary rate for assigned judges, which is set by state law, is $715.15 per day.

These judges often substitute for vacationing judges and work other short-term assignments.

The judge's actual daily gross is $657.94 as they retain 92 percent and 8 percent goes to a judicial retirement system, according to the AOC.